1. Field of Endeavor
The present invention relates to corrosion and more particularly to corrosion resistant material.
2. State of Technology
U.S. Pat. No. 6,258,185 issued Jul. 10, 2001 to Daniel Branagan and Joseph V. Burch for methods of forming steel provides the following state of technology information:
“4. A method of forming a steel, comprising: forming a molten alloy; cooling the alloy at a rate which forms a metallic glass; devitrifying the metallic glass to convert the glass to a crystalline steel material having a nanocrystalline scale grain size; and transforming a portion of the crystalline steel material to metallic glass.
8. The method of claim 4 wherein the molten alloy comprises: at least 50% Fe; at least one element selected from the group consisting of Ti, Zr, HF, V, Nb, Ta, Cr, Mo, W, Al, La, Ce, Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, Yb, and Lu; and at least one element selected from the group consisting of B, C, N, O, P and S.
9. The method of claim 4 wherein the molten alloy comprises a material selected from the group consisting of Fe69 Zr3 Mo7 P16 C3 Si2, Fe71 Ti3 Cr7 B14 C3 Si2, Fe68 Cr4 Mo7 P12 B6 C3, DNA3, DNS2C, and DNA6.
14. A method of forming a steel, comprising: providing a first metallic glass steel substrate; forming a molten alloy over the first metallic glass steel substrate to heat and devitrify at least some of the underlying metallic glass of the steel substrate.
18. The method of claim 14 wherein the molten alloy comprises a material selected from the group consisting of Fe69 Zr3 Mo7 P16 C3 Si2, Fe71 Ti3 Cr7 B14 C3 Si2, Fe68 Cr4 Mo7 P12 B6 C3, DNA3, DNS2C and DNA6.
19. The method of claim 14 wherein the first metallic glass substrate comprises a material selected from the group consisting of Fe69 Zr3 Mo7 P16 C3 Si2, Fe71 Ti3 Cr7 B14 C3 Si2, Fe68 Cr4 Mo7 P12 B6 C3, DNA3, DNS2C and DNA6.” (Claims 4, 8, 9, 14, 18, and 19)
U.S. Pat. No. 6,767,419 issued Jul. 27, 2004 to Daniel Branagan for methods of forming hardened surfaces provides the following state of technology information: “A method of forming a hardened surface on a substrate, comprising: providing a substrate; forming a molten alloy and cooling said alloy to form a metallic glass coating on the substrate; the forming comprising a successive build-up of metallic glass layers, the metallic glass comprising one or more materials selected from the group consisting of (Fe0.85 Cr0.15)83 B17, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)83 B17, (Fe0.75 Cr0.25)83 B17, (Fe0.6 Co0.2 Cr0.2)83 B 17, (Fe0.8 Cr0.15 Mo0.05)83 B17, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)79 B17 C4, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)79 B17 Si4, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2 )79 B17 Al4, (Fe0.8Cr0.2)75 B17 Al4 C4, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)75 B17 Si4 C4, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)75 B17 Si4 Al4, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)71 B17 Si4 C4 Al4, (Fe0.7 Co0.1 Cr0.2)83 B17, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)80 B20, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)76 B17 Al7, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)79 B17 W2 C2, (Fe0.8 Cr0.2)81 B17 W2, and Fe 64 Ti 3 Cr 5 Mo2 B16 C5 Si1 Al2 La2; the metallic glass coating having a hardness of at least about 9.2 GPa and converting at least a portion of the metallic glass coating to a crystalline material having a nanocrystalline grain size.” (Claim 13)
United States Patent Application No. 2003/0051781 by Daniel J. Branagan for hard metallic materials, hard metallic coatings, methods of processing metallic materials and methods of producing metallic coatings, published Mar. 20, 2003 provides the following state of technology information: “Both microcrystalline grain internal structures and metallic glass internal structures can have properties which are desirable in particular applications for steel. In some applications, the amorphous character of metallic glass can provide desired properties. For instance, some glasses can have exceptionally high strength and hardness. In other applications, the particular properties of microcrystalline grain structures are preferred. Frequently, if the properties of a grain structure are preferred, such properties will be improved by decreasing the grain size. For instance, desired properties of microcrystalline grains (i.e., grains having a size on the order of 10−6 meters) can frequently be improved by reducing the grain size to that of nanocrystalline grains (i.e., grains having a size on the order of 10−9 meters). It is generally more problematic, and not generally possible utilizing conventional approaches, to form grains of nanocrystalline grain size than it is to form grains of microcrystalline grain size.”
United States Patent Application No. 2005/0013723 for formation of metallic thermal barrier alloys by Daniel James Branagan published Jan. 20, 2005 provides the following state of technology information: “Metals and metallic alloys have metallic bonds consisting of metal ion cores surrounded by a sea of electrons. These free electrons which arise from an unfilled outer energy band allow the metal to have high electrical and thermal conductivity which makes this class of materials conductors. Due to the nature of the metallic bonds, metals and metallic alloys may exhibit a characteristic range of properties such as electrical and thermal conductivity. Typical metallic materials may exhibit values of electrical resistivity that generally fall in a range of between about 1.5 to 145 10−8 Ωm, with iron having an electrical resistivity of about 8.6 10−8 Ωm. Typical values of thermal conductivity for metallic materials may be in a range of between about 0.2 to 4.3 watts/cm° C., with iron exhibiting a thermal conductivity of about 0.8 watts/cm° C. (Paragraph [0003]) By contrast, ceramics are a class of materials which typically contain positive ions and negative ions resulting from electron transfer from a cation atom to an anion atom. All of the electron density in ceramics is strongly bonded resulting in a filled outer energy band. Ceramic alloys, due to the nature of their ionic bonding, will exhibit a different characteristic range of properties such as electrical and thermal conductivity. Because of the lack of free electrons, ceramics generally have poor electrical and thermal conductivity and are considered insulators. Thus, ceramics may be suitable for use in applications such as thermal barrier coatings while metals are not. (Paragraph [0004]) Designing a metal alloy to exhibit ceramic like electrical and thermal conductivities is unique. The only area where this has been utilized in material science is in the design of soft magnetic materials for transformer core applications. In such applications, extra silicon is added to iron in order to specifically reduce the electrical conductivity to minimize eddy current losses. However, iron-silicon alloys utilized for transformer cores typically contain a maximum of 2.5 at % (atomic percent) silicon because any additional silicon embrittles the alloy. Additionally, attempts to reduce electrical conductivity of iron transformer cores have not addressed reduced thermal conductivity.” (Paragraph [0005])